A little about me

I am in Christ; Jeff's wife; Joshua, Anna, Abigail and Samuel's mum. My husband pastors a Baptist church in a little country town in West Australia. I am, therefore, "the Pastor's Wife" - but I do not cook scones, play the organ, or {add your own stereotype here}. I love studying the Bible, because it helps me to love God more. I enjoy helping others engage more closely with the Bible, whether they be my own children, other children (in the past I have worked as a Children's Ministry Worker) or other women (leading Bible study small groups). I also enjoy my chickens and lambs.

Friday, 20 November 2009

Ahem... This post is Number 555. It was going to be #500 but that just didn't happen. So in honour of the occasion, I am revealing five things about me that you probably didn't know and may never have guessed. Here we go:

First Thing About MeI once liked eating mud.Second Thing About MeI wrote poetry as a teenager, and one of my poems was published in real poetry anthology, which was even named after my poem! Mind you, it was published a dozen years ago now and I can't find it for sale anywhere online... I can only find it on ISBNDB. Very disappointing. Well, someone has it for sale on ebay, if you want a copy. I have one already, gratis.Just in case you'd like a teaser... I Like Doing Bombers off the Jetty is a "breath length poem", so you need to take a deep breath and read the first stanza all at once without pausing to take a breath, if you can. Here are the first two stanzas, my favourites:

I like doing bombers off the jetty when the tide's right & the day's hot & the water's cold & a small school of white bait has just swum under the jetty & into the sun so I can land on top of them & scatter all the fish & when I bob up all I can see through lids closed to keep out the salt sea sting is white froth & bubbles everywhere.I also like the minister's son.

Third Thing About MeI caught the bouquet at a wedding where I was chief bridesmaid (thanks Inara!) and was married within nine months to a man I had never met before catching the bouquet. Sometimes old wives' tales do come true!Err... just in case you are wondering, that new man in my life was Jeff, the father of our four children, to whom I have now been married for nine years.This photo was taken shortly after we were engaged, seven weeks after we met.(And in a pleasant addition to this memory, I now wear this same dress to church, since having lost so much weight over the last year, it now fits me again for the first time in most of our marriage.)

Fourth Thing About MeI have a Graduate Diploma of Education.I worked teaching kids maths, science and even IT in secondary school for six years before I "retired" to mother my own class-ful.

Fifth Thing About MeI also have a tattoo. When my father first saw it - on the day of my wedding - his first comment was, "Good thing you're going to be his problem from now on!" And I once had my tongue pierced. Now you know why my father made that comment!For the record, I took the stud out shortly before Jeff and I were married. Three reasons:(1) In playing with the stud, I found that I was knocking it against my teeth a lot, and eventually I managed to chip one or two.(2) Having something large and rigid stuck through the middle of your tongue changes the way you speak. I found that I was developing a somewhat physiologically-, somewhat psychologically-influenced stutter, which was getting worse. I have had the stud out for ten times longer than I had it in now, but I still stutter once in a blue moon, and I never did before I had it in.(3) Since Jeff was the only person I'd be kissing (or at least, to use a word I learnt in the schoolyard, "pashing") from now on, I asked him whether he preferred it in or out. Jeff voted for out. So it went.The tattoo remains.

What an amazing post. I thought fact one was brave! And you got more and more courageous as you continued on. You took me by surprise! Especially as I continue to associate you with puffed sleeves! Not that I would picture you in puffed sleeves as such. Did you feel every so slightly nervous as you hit PUBLISH or liberated or were you having a bit of a laugh?

Interesting with the stutter. I spent a year with a speech therapist with one of our boys eliminating a stutter. They have made big progress on stuttering and now consider it to be related to the muscles in the throat and around the larynx and these muscles can be trained in such a way that eliminates a stutter - which has been our story happily. But interesting to note that in changing the "structure" in your mouth obviously caused the muscles to constrict creating a stutter. So you can eliminate the stutter by resting the affected muscles - often as simply as pausing and taking a deep breath.

Yeah, I was having a bit of a laugh when I posted. And there's a whole lot more (even more shocking - or hilarious, depending on your point of view!) I could have included that I didn't. So I wasn't nervous as I hit PUBLISH. Everything really terrible in my past is covered by the blood of Christ.

It is handy to have an occasion such as a significant post to write something more personal, revealing details that give an idea of my personality that you might not get from reading most of my posts. Not everyone who reads my blog knows me in person, and even those who do haven't known me forever.

I wasn't always the frequently blogging, Wife-of-a-Pastor Mum-to-Four who loves to read good books and earnestly desires to please God that I am now... well, yeah, I always loved to read good books. But the rest are all quite new. Who I am now has grown out of who I was then. Add the transforming power of Christ, and wha-lah! You have the Wife of a Pastor! He he he he he.

Re: "Everything really terrible in my past is covered by the blood of Christ." AMEN! My "really terrible" doesn't show up in pictures but if you could see in my heart...it was equally in need of redemption and He is faithful!

Noddy Goes to Toyland, Hurrah for Little Noddy, Noddy and His Car, Here Comes Noddy, Well Done, Noddy!, Noddy Goes to School, Noddy at the Seaside, Noddy and the Magic Rubber, Noddy and Tessie Bear and Noddy Gets into Trouble by Enid Blyton

2013:

The really-and-truly-final-book (#12) in the Ranger's Apprentice series, The Royal Ranger by John Flanagan

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi by Rudyard Kipling - on audible.com audiobook

Anna and I read Earth Unaware and Earth Afire by Orson Scott Card and Aaron Johnston together, since Anna loved reading Ender's Game and the Ender's Shadow series earlier this year

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

Swallows and Amazons, Swallowdale and Winter Holiday by Arthur Ransome

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein (again)

Just So Stories by Rudyard Kipling

Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne

Between the Lines by Jodi Picoult and Samantha Van Leer, read aloud in turns by Anna and Joshua (the fairy tale chapters), Jeff (Oliver's chapters) and me (Delilah's chapters).

(What we thought was) the last book (number 11) in the Ranger's Apprentice series: The Lost Stories by John Flanagan

2012:

Ranger's Apprentice Books 1-10: The Ruins of Gorlan, The Burning Bridge, The Icebound Land, Oakleaf Bearers, The Sorcerer in the North, The Siege of Macindaw, Erak's Ransom, The Kings of Clonmel, Halt's Peril and The Emperor of Nihon-Ja by John Flanagan

Horrendo's Curse by Anna Fienberg

Five Go To Smuggler's Top by Enid Blyton [audiobook CD]

Danny, the Champion of the World, Fantastic Mr Fox, The Witches and The Twits by Roald Dahl [audiobook CD]

The Borrowers, The Borrowers Afield, The Borrowers Afloat, The Borrowers Aloft, The Borrowers Avenged, and Poor Stainless by Mary Norton

The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling [audiobook CD]

James and the Giant Peach,The BFG, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator by Roald Dahl [audiobook CD]

Clarice Bean Spells Trouble by Lauren Child [audiobook CD]

Cry of the Cat by Emily Rhodda [audiobook CD]

Anne of Avonlea by LM Montgomery [audiobook CD]

2011:

The Hobbit, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King by JRR Tolkein: Yes, even our 4yo listened to The Lord of the Rings!